We’re at the Senior Center of West Seattle in The Junction (northeast corner of California/Oregon), where the big upstairs meeting room is the site of the first open house for the Fauntleroy Way Green Boulevard proposal (official city website here). Five SDOT staffers are here, answering questions and talking with people at two identical tables, each of which is set up with a long rectangular map showing the area under consideration, Fauntleroy between 35th SW and SW Alaska. There are also stacks of forms on which you can write your thoughts. Also here, Brian Hawksford from the office of City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, the West Seattleite who chairs the council’s Transportation Committee. What SDOT is hearing from participants so far includes questions about : They’re asking about a water line under the road. Some have suggested trees and raised planters. A concern was voiced about the safety of people walking over to Trader Joe’s, including from Link Apartments across Fauntleroy. Would this mean no bus service on Fauntleroy? planners were asked. Some are also asking about bicycle access (Seattle Bike Blog asked the question in this story). And there are questions about whether the “boulevard” concept could continue further south on Fauntleroy. The open house continues till 6 pm – just drop by, ask a question, write a comment (or e-mail one later – contact info’s at the end here).

5:17 PM UPDATE: We asked what happens next – answer, in addition to taking comments, here and via e-mail, SDOT is also doing traffic/pedestrian studies in the area, to see which of the potential alternatives might work best. Then they’ll come up with the “10 percent conceptual design concept” by the end of the year, before this proceeds further; right now, as was pointed out to us last week, that’s all the funding this project has ($250,000) – more funding would have to be budgeted for full design, let alone construction. As for whether more public meetings are planned – that’s still up in the air; this is the only one they originally planned, SDOT says (though it was not officially announced till this week, aside from postcards that arrived in some nearby homes last week, which is how we indirectly found out about the meeting last Friday).

4 Comments

There is a safety problem with getting to the new Trader Joes. The buses that come from the junction only stop once at Jefferson Square, then not again till they cross Fauntleroy. This leaves pedestrians having to cross a very busy and wide part of that street with drivers just off the bridge and often driving rather fast. My self and quite a lot of people I have watched are just getting off at Jefferson Square and walking down to Trader Joes but there should be a closer stop that isn’t on the other side of Fauntleroy.

My thought is that between:
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- “Rapid” Ride,
- “Green” Boulevards
- “Road Diets”
- Zero actual rapid transit actually planned…
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The people of West Seattle will not be getting anywhere at much more than a crawl for the foreseeable future.

i emailed the following letter to the SDOT Project Team contacts:
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I am a West Seattle resident and homeowner, writing to express my opinion on the possibility and concept of the Fauntleroy Way Green Boulevard.
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I am very much in favor of greenways along the lines of what the City of Portland has done, which involves modifying certain NON arterial streets to give priority to bicyclists and pedestrians. (From the Portland Bureau of Transportation website: “residential streets with low volumes of auto traffic and low speeds where bicycle and pedestrians are given priority.”)
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On a couple recent visits to Portland (in my car, I might add), I admired how they’ve funneled bike and foot traffic to the greenways while making arterials (akin to Fauntleroy Way) friendlier to cars and mass transit. We need something like that, not a greening of our arterials.